This is an eye-opening and scary book that will alert you to the peril our civilization is in right now. You might not know this, but sometime in the last few years we reached the half-way point in extracting all the oil there is on Earth to extract. This might not sound so bad, but that first half was the easy-to-get-at, easy-to-process, easier-on-the-environment half, and everything we get from here on will cost more to get out of the ground and be dirtier, like the tar sands in Canada which are getting so much bad press. Kunstler is a voice in the wilderness, denouncing our careless energy policies and proposed energy solutions. Natural gas, nuclear, shale oil and several other candidates are shown to be unrealistic pipe dreams, and Kunstler warns that we'd all better start learning some nineteenth-century skills if we want to survive and prosper. He lays it on pretty thick, and his obvious nostalgia for a simpler way of life justifies some skepticism about his arguments, but it's a good companion to his World Made By Hand novels. Here's his podcast URL for those who want more information:http://kunstlercast.com/